Psalm 119:154

Verse 154. -- Plead my cause. I do not know that David meant, by calling upon God to plead his cause, anything more than that he should vindicate his innocence, and make it manifest to all, by delivering him out of the hand of all his enemies; but whether he had an ulterior reference or no, the word powerfully and sweetly recalls to every Christian heart him who was indeed to be the Advocate for poor sinners, even Jesus Christ the righteous, who is the propitiation for our sins. --Barton Bouchier.

Verse 154. -- Plead my cause. The children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of God. Which made David here pray to God that he would plead his cause, and be his Advocate against all their lies. He trusted not to the equity of his own cause, but to the Lord. From whence we gather, that the cause why our oppressors prevail oft against us is, because we trust too much in our own wits, and lean too much upon our own inventions; opposing subtilty to subtilty, one evil device to another, matching and maintaining policy by policy, and not committing our cause to God. --Abraham Wright.

Verse 154. -- Deliver. Not as in Psalms 119:153 , but a word meaning to redeem, or to save by avenging. The corresponding participle is rendered redeemer, avenger, revenger, kinsman, near kinsman, next kinsman. --William S. Plumer.

Verse 154. -- Quicken me. Here, again, we are called to consider the bearing of the pious mind. Ever and anon, the great desire of the man of God is to advance in the divine life. He makes spiritual gain of everything. He seeks his goodly pearls out of strange conditions; the reason is, his heart is in these things. Deliverance from temporal evil, deliverance from spiritual evil, both were sought; but along with these, ever does the man of God take up the prayer to be quickened. Certainly we may understand him as seeking life. Such is the import of the phraseology; but in a man like David, the life he seeks must be the highest. He desires spiritual life above all things; he wants to get more into a blessed assimilation to God, that so he may enjoy the highest good. So pants the heaven born soul...Give the believer this, and this will set him above all the ills of life. And this and all good had been promised in the word. So he prays, "Quicken me according to the word." He goes upon the word for everything; he cannot be self deceived there. Judge of yourselves, my brethren, by your spiritual aspirations. Nothing less will prove you to be of the Lord's redeemed. --John Stephen.

Verse 154, 156, 159. -- Quicken me. Pray to be quickened, as the Psalmist often does, and look unto Jesus, who is a quickening spirit: 1 Corinthians 15:45 . "The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit." As he has given you life, so he is ready to give it more and more abundantly; this will make you to live to him, and to be unweariedly active for him. --Nathanael Vincent, in "A Present for such as have been Sick and Recovered," 1693.

HINTS FOR PASTORS AND LAYPERSONS

Outlines Upon Keywords of the Psalm, By Pastor C. A. Davis.

Verse 154,156,159. -- The threefold quickening. A capital subject, if the contexts are carefully considered.

Verse 154. -- Intercession, deliverance, quickening, and all in faithfulness to the word.

Verse 154. -- A prayer.

--G.R.

Verse 154. -- The Advocate.

--C.A.D.